I have arrived in Sydney!!

I have been in Sydney for a few days now. I was staying at Robert Menzies College (right across the street from MacQuarrie University or Uni). During the summer, the college offers short-term accommodation for $60 / day. Not too bad, as long as you are willing to stay in student residences and share a bathroom with 15 other women. Actually, considering that the price includes your meals at the cafeteria, it is a pretty decent price ( especially if you manage to be there at mealtimes).

I was staying there because I needed to be at MacQuarrie yesterday morning for my LSAT exam. No matter how much you prepare for the LSAT, it is a tough exam. I had the worst time with the logic games. I can always solve them, but they take me 20 minutes and you have about 8.5 minutes per game. Hopefully I got some marks for all the questions I had to guess at !!

It was very interesting doing the LSAT. You show Photo ID at the door and they take a thumbprint image on the admittance form. We had to be there by 8:30 and by the time we completed all the administration it was 9:15. We had one ten minute break and were not done until at least 1:15pm. Grueling!!! We had about one minute between ending one session and then starting on the next section, six sections in total. I used the Kaplan material for preparing and they recommend that you read each section, critically, and then when you move to the next section, just forget it. To me, the LSAT is like that, just do it, then move on.

So after the LSAT, I spent the afternoon looking for accommodations. Very interesting experience getting around the city. It is always fun to travel by bus and train to areas of town, you know nothing about, to find a place to live

I was quite lucky. The first person. Gillian, met me at the Milsons Point train station and drove me around Kirribilli. It is a lovely area just south of North Sydney and reminds me of the Glebe or Westboro. Lots of lovely little shops and restaurants along the street. But it was also small. It felt like a little town within a city. Gillian had a friend who also had a place available, so after seeing Gillian’s place, Eoin picked me up. Eoin also gave me a little tour. Hearing that I was new to the area and had not yet been across the Sydney Bridge, Eoin took me across so I could experience the bridge. He was great, after seeing his place, Eoin, drove me to the third place and offered to swing by later to give me a ride back to MacQuarrie.

So my day consisted of writing a tough exam and then being escorted around town by two complete strangers. It reminds me of the famous quote (from the movie A Streetcar Named Desire, which I have never seen, but remember the quote). . . I have always depended on the kindness of strangers. Well that certainly was my case yesterday!!